Edison's Study and Moonlight Garden, 1928

In his initial plans for the property, Edison included a laboratory for his Florida estate as a place to pursue inventing during leisure time. Among the many experiments he worked on there was a form of underwater telegraphy, using steam explosions in rapid succession to form a musical note and long and short pauses like Morse code to signal three or four miles, and he found Florida waters especially suitable because they were free from other sounds. The 1886 laboratory contained equipment for mechanical and chemical experiments, and while $12,000 was spent building and furnishing each home, $16,000 was spent on the laboratory. Many elements inside came from Edison’s various companies, including a dynamo powered by a coal-fired steam boiler that provided electricity for the estate in 1887, eleven years before the City of Fort Myers was electrified in 1898. The original 1886 laboratory was sold to Henry Ford and in 1928 was moved to his collection of historic buildings at Greenfield Village in Dearborn, Michigan, where it became the base of operations for the Edison Institute, a project to study and retain Edison’s inventions that remains open to visitors today. On the original footprint of the 1886 laboratory, Ford financed construction of Edison’s Study and Mina Edison’s Moonlight Garden.

Fort Myers, Florida · United States